


The Boss

by messitallup



Series: The Hairdressers!AU [2]
Category: My Chemical Romance
Genre: Implied/Referenced Sexual Harassment, M/M, Sexual Harassment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-10
Updated: 2014-04-10
Packaged: 2018-01-18 21:45:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1443991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/messitallup/pseuds/messitallup
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gerard gets a new job at DC and loves it there, yeah, his boss is a little creepy, but there are downsides to every job, right?<br/>*Set before The Hairdresser, I felt the need to explain why Gerard was in England and why his brother didn't want people asking about Gee's job*</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Boss

**Author's Note:**

> This is set before The Hairdresser, but you can read them in any order.  
> I felt the need to give an explanation why Gerard was in England and why his job was such a touchy subject, so this came into being. No Frank here guys, sorry, and trigger warnings for attempted rape and sexual harassment.

Gerard couldn’t quite believe it. Well, he could, but it was still slightly surreal. He’d worked for months on his idea for The Black Parade, countless sleepless nights working overtime in his shitty little studio his old publisher had given him, frame after frame of his comic’s story board, elaborate and detailed, the whole arc, not just first section in the story.  
He’d slaved for months on this and now he’d just pitched it to one of the biggest comic book and graphic novel publisher studios, fucking hell. Holy shit didn’t even begin to cover it.

And coming out of the studios he’d even managed to bump in Grant Morrison. Grant fucking Morrison. How insane was his life?

All he had to do was wait for the phone call now – they said they would phone him. What did that mean? Did that mean they’d liked it? Or not? Maybe they hated it?

The doubt had started to creep back into Gerard’s mind, had he just embarrassed himself in front of some of the most prestigious names in the industry? Fuck. He could really do with a drink right now. Whiskey would calm his nerves, just a little glass. No one would know, and what Mikey and his mum didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them.

Fucking fuck, no, okay, he needed to calm down, because worrying wasn’t going to get him anywhere. Coffee, he needed coffee, and he could see the Starbucks at the end of the street beckoning him forward. He pulled out his wallet, double checking he had enough money for a cab ride home and for coffee, which he did, before marching down the street, a man on a mission, and pushing the door open.

The sweet scent of coffee greeted him, quiet chatter and the sound of wiring machines, there wasn’t a huge queue, but still one. Gerard hated queuing, even if it was only five people that were stood in front of him.

His phone vibrated once in his pocket, showing he had a text and he pulled it out of his pocket, turning it on and unlocking it. Huh, it was from Mikey.

_Hw’d the pitch go? Ok? Hope ur ok_ _J_

Gerard started typing out a reply before thinking the better of it and dialling his number.

“Mikey hey…”

Sixth months after the pitch, Gerard was walking into his studio office, chatting to Grant about his newest ideas for his series, a cup of hot coffee in his hand. After Grant had recognised him as the new guy who had bumped into him coming out of the pitch room, he had demanded Gerard buy him a new coffee to make up for the one ruined and they had become very close friends.

 

Half the time Gerard couldn’t believe he’d done it, he had his own office, his own series – that wasn’t self-published – and _actual friends_ who were interested in what he was interested in too, and some were semi-famous. Holy mother of fuck didn’t even _begin_ to cover it.

The other half the time he felt like his didn’t deserve it. What was different about him to everyone else that meant that he’d made it here? He was a recovering alcoholic, who to be honest was a bit of a pretentious idiot sometimes, so why was he here? What made him so different to the hundreds of other struggling artists everywhere else?

“… and so I was thinking of killing them off, but I didn’t really know how that would go down—” Grant stopped mid-sentence seeing Gerard’s boss standing in the middle of his studio, “You know what Gerard, I think I’ll come back later, we can finish this then?”

“Yeah, of course, don’t worry about it,” Gerard said, but his eyes were begging, _please don’t leave me with him._

It was no secret that Gerard’s boss terrified him and basically everyone else in their department. No one wanted to get on his bad side, or good side. In fact it was pretty much proven that the only way you had a long and prosperous career in the company was if you went next to unnoticed by Tim, which was unfortunate for Gerard, you know, him being his boss and all.

Grant shot Gerard a small apologetic look, nodded to Tim, who basically ignored Grant anyway, and walked out of the room, the door shutting behind him with a small click of finality.

“Gerard, how’ve you been?” Gerard’s boss asked, eyes glinting unnervingly in the light.

“Good, good thanks you, umm, yeah, I’ve been good, working hard,” Gerard gestured to his work, strewn across his desk in an unorganised chaos. Tim had clearly been going through it, looking at bits Gerard had half finished, moving things and shuffling them.

“Yes, I can clearly see that, I came to inform you that your deadline has been pushed forward a week, so now instead of being on the 18th, it’s going to be on the 11th. Is this okay with you?”

Fuck he was so formal, Gerard hated it.

“Yeah, that should be fine with me. I was due to finish up before the deadline anyway, so it shouldn’t affect the progress of the comic. Should be fine.” Gerard turned away from his towards his story board, neatening up some of the piles that had been disturbed when Tim had been going through them, sorting the rough sketches from the final frames. Gerard had, of course, been offered a team to help him with his inking and drawing and generally help the comic along, but he chose to do it all himself. That way he felt the comic was purely, and unarguably his and he could do exactly what he wanted with it. It wasn’t someone else’s interpretation of his vision, it was entirely his.

“Good, good,” Gerard felt Tim come closer, almost touching his body to Gerard’s body and Gerard shuddered. The closeness in proximity made him feel uncomfortable, especially when Tim leaned over him and pointed at one of the nearly finished frames.

“This one could do with a bit of work,” Tim stated, it was non-arguable, a final statement. It was not good enough.

“Yes sir, I’ll get to work on it,” Gerard stammered out, and he felt Tim let out a breath against his ear. His skin crawled.

“Good, I’m expecting great things from this comic, Gerard. If not, you will be punished, understood?”

Gerard nodded, he hated this. He hated his boss, and he hated when his boss made him feel like this, worthless and weak, like he could do nothing to defend himself.

“I’m glad we understand each other,” Tim drew back, “I shall come back and check on you sometime this week, I expect you to be nearly finished understood?” And he turned on his heel and left the room.

Gerard sucked in a breath, the walls suddenly closing in on him. He had to steady himself with a hand on his chair, closing his eyes for a moment before letting the air go, escaping from his lungs a shaky movement.  
Fuck he needed a cigarette.

***

It was the Christmas party, and Gerard couldn't believe it, he’d finished his first big comic series not two weeks ago. The Black Parade had gone down astonishingly well for a debt into the world of big comics, selling more than his past three series. It was crazy. 

Everyone had turned up to their work place, celebrating and drinking (Gerard chose not to partake in that option and instead was nursing a coke), and Grant was talking to a young, pretty thing and Gerard was occasionally inputting into the conversation when the opportunity arose, not that he was short of conversation. Most people were actually coming up to talk to him, to congratulate him on the success of his series. Fuck, even Christian Marinelli, head Gerard's department and near God in the workplace had come to speak to him.  
Though this, throughout the night Gerard had been working to avoid Tim, who had apparently been looking for him majority of the night, and that was the only thing to put a dampener on things; he was with his close friends, no work left to do, and at a party. He had no craving for alcohol and only a slight one for a cigarette. The food was good and the music wasn't shitty, actually, he would almost swear they’d been playing Black Flag when Gerard had come in.

“Hey, Grant, I’m just going to go have a cigarette, you coming?” Gerard interjected when he saw a lapse in conversation. He knew Grant wasn't going to come, he didn't smoke as far as Gerard was aware, but it was polite to offer, plus he could to do with the company.

“No, thanks,” Grant drawled in his loping Scottish accent, “I might be out in a minute though?”

Gerard nodded in acknowledgement, but had already turned and started walking towards the door, fumbling around in his jeans’ pocket for his lighter and cigarettes, tipping a fag out of the box and placing it between his lips as he walked outside.

The cold air hit him like a punch in the gut, harsh and knocking the breath out of him. He scrabbled with his lighter, trying to light it before his hands turned too numb, and when he finally got it lit, he watched the cars pass across the street, only lights zooming passed in the dark.

When finally had sucked the last puff out of the glowing stick, he dropped it into the snow piling at the side of the pavement and watched the glowing end flicker out and the snow melt around it, creating a little circle of semi-melted slush around the butt of the cigarette.

“Can I borrow your light?” Asked a husky voice from Gerard’s left.

Gerard looked over to see his boss regarding him with predatory eyes, shining disconcertingly, reflecting the street in muddy pools of dirt that were his pupils.  
Gerard used to believe that you could see the intentions of others’ in their eyes, he didn’t any more, but if he did, he would’ve predicted what was to happen next easily.

Gerard stretched his arm out, holding his lighter out to Tim, who, instead of taking the light, wrapped his hands around Gerard’s and pulled him towards him.

Gerard, dumbfounded, didn’t struggled as he was towed into a back alley, around the back of the building, before he realised what was going to happen. He tried to pull his arm back, but it had been secured tightly in his boss’ grip.

“What the fuck let go of me!” Gerard yanked as hard as he could, but to no avail, “What the fuck is wrong with you?!”

“SHUT UP! SHUT UP, SHUT UP, SHUT UP!” Roared Tim, eyes widening in fury, “Don’t act like you don’t fucking want this, you want this, otherwise you’re just a lying slut! You’ve been giving me signals for months! So now, I’m taking what I want! So shut the fuck up!”

Tim was slightly creepy and harsh, cold and sterile in Gerard’s mind, but Gerard never would’ve guessed that he would’ve tried to do this.

“I haven’t—what?” Gerard struggled, but Tim had securely placed a hand round Gerard’s mouth and was now sucking at his neck, “Fuck OFF!” Gerard tried to say, but it only came out as a slightly aggressive mumble.

“What’s going on back here?” Christian Marinelli’s voice echoed down the small alley, harsh and expectant. Christian was head of the department at DC and had hired Gerard.

Tim let go of Gerard like he was on fire and looked harshly forward, cold and clinical once again, emitting a creepy aura of, _do not fuck with me._

Gerard shrank back into the wall he had been roughly shoved against, and whimpered, clutching his wrists where he had been pulled, “I just… he attacked me in the street! I don’t know what I did!” Tim said rushing slightly.

“Which is, of course why, Mr Way here is sporting more bruises than you, and also looked like he was about to be sexually harassed. You know we do not tolerate any form of harassment, no matter your standing.”

“Yes, of course… but… but that’s not what happened!” Tim forced out, Gerard could see his façade fading and crumbling.

“Yes it is,” Gerard surprised at the strength within his voice, “It is.”

Tim looked back and forth between them, the head of department, and his worker, united together against him, took a moment for thought and then ran.

“I guess you’ll be pressing charges, Gerard,” Christian sighed, “I never knew this is what would happen, I’m so sorry.”

Gerard shook his head, still in shock at what had happened, “I think, I need… I need to call my brother, I need, I need to,” he stopped and felt round to his back pocket where his phone had been, but found it wasn't there, Gerard concluded that it must have fallen during the encounter at some point, searching the floor around him.

“Here, use mine,” Christian offered his phone out to Gerard who took it gratefully, hands shaking slightly as he inputted the number.

The dial tone seemed to go on forever as he waited for Mikey to pick up, and when he did all he could manage was a shaking, _Mikey_ , before he broke down, and his brother demanding down the phone to know what had happened, was everything okay? Their mum, dad alright?

Gerard had his hand over his mouth unable to speak, so Christian took the phone off him and spoke calmly into the device,  
“Your brother has had a horrible experience tonight, he was attacked… Christian Marinelli speaking – no, by his boss, Tim?... Yes, I can do that – of course, yes. Of course, I’ll give him time off to visit you, I don’t think it… No it’s not a good idea for him to go back to work this early… Of course, I’m sorry for interrupting you. Goodnight.”

Christian ended the call before looking back up a Gerard, “I’m giving you as long as you want off, you’ve just finished your latest series, correct?” Gerard could only nod, “Good, book a flight, go see your family, I’m not expecting you back at the studios any time soon, until you’re ready.”

***

The next evening, Gerard stood in London, Heathrow airport, almost empty it was so late at night, being embraced by his brother.

The only thing the younger man had said to him was:   
“Oh Gerard, don’t worry,” pausing to look him up and down before continuing, “Actually, you need a bit of a haircut don’t you?” tugging on the locks that fell just at Gerard’s shoulders. “Come on. Let’s get out of here and get you booked into a hotel. I always hated airports.”

And suddenly Gerard was so very pleased he had his little brother.


End file.
